


The Escape

by fortytworedvines



Category: Holby City
Genre: Drama!, Escape!, F/F, Fix-It, alex is crazy, happy reunion, kidnap situation, one-sided alex/bernie, slight crack, the final fix
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-21
Updated: 2020-01-21
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:42:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22351273
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fortytworedvines/pseuds/fortytworedvines
Summary: It’s hard to end a relationship. Even harder when the person you’re trying to dump has faked your death and kept you cuffed to their radiator for the last six months. But if anyone can find a way, Bernie Wolfe can.
Relationships: Serena Campbell/Bernie Wolfe
Comments: 18
Kudos: 114
Collections: The Final Countdown





	The Escape

**Author's Note:**

> With thanks to Batnbreakfast and Picardcrusher for letting me borrow their headcanons. And Wonko for reading through it and providing me with title and summary (again).

“I dropped in to the hospital today,” Alex says as she closes and locks the front door, puts the key in the safe.

“Oh?” Bernie says, as casually as possible. _The_ hospital in their life, despite the many various locations they’ve worked in, is Holby City. And if Alex has been there then – then…

“I saw Serena.” Alex looks at her closely, and Bernie keeps her features as neutral as possible, shrugs nonchalantly. “Don’t you want to know how she is?” Alex taunts.

“Do you want to tell me?” Bernie says, flatly.

“Last week she was on the verge of being made redundant, and she just got herself arrested.”

“Arrested?” Try as she might, Bernie can’t keep the shock out of her voice.

The triumphant look that Alex shoots her makes her kick herself. “Some fight over porters,” Alex says. “And how are you today?” She strides over to where Bernie is handcuffed to the radiator and Bernie tries not to flinch as she checks that the handcuffs are secure, traces the welts on her wrists that are the result of months of wearing them. “It would be easier on us both if you just accepted this, Bern.”

But she can’t. When Alex had pulled her out of the rubble of the hospital in Mogadishu, she’d been unconscious, and when she’d come to, she’d been here. Stuck in this cottage in the pleasant countryside of England with no clue how long she’d been unconscious, how she’d got there, or why Alex was keeping her captive. Eventually, she’d figured it out. Alex, the woman she’d once loved, was absolutely batshit insane. Every little piece of her plan to make Bernie’s loved ones think she was dead had been relayed in painstaking detail, her success gloated over, as Bernie lay still, recovering from her injuries and always, always handcuffed.

For a while Bernie hoped that perhaps Cameron would notice the mistakes Alex had made – giving him both the dog tags had been a big one – and would somehow realise she was still alive. But he hadn’t. Alex had reported on her funeral, how Cameron had received and spread her ashes (actually those of an unfortunate woman in Mogadishu to whom Bernie had borne a passing resemblance. And under all that rubble, after several weeks, and with Bernie’s dog tags, who was going to question her identity?) and Bernie had felt her hope gradually fade. But still, the last shreds of fight in her refused to disappear. For the last few weeks every time Alex had left the house she’d been doing as much exercise as she could manage, trying to build back the strength that her injuries and captivity had lost.

That evening, Alex turns on the news with a triumphant look on her face. Bernie watches, biting the inside of her cheek. Watches Serena being marched to a police car, hands in handcuffs that are almost a match to the ones that Bernie is wearing herself.

Alex strokes her hair and Bernie suppresses a shudder. The steely reserve on Serena’s face fills her with determination. She’ll get back to Serena if it’s the last thing she does.

That night, she swings herself awkwardly from the bed, moving as carefully as possible to not wake Alex – they share a bed, in this grotesque parody of a relationship that Alex has constructed for them. It’s taken a lot of work but she can walk without limping now, keeps her footsteps as light as possible as she slips from the bedroom into the bathroom. She’s in luck; Alex has left a hairgrip out. It’s awkward and it hurts but she manages to manipulate the hairgrip into the locking mechanism of one of the cuffs. Some fumbling and whispered curses later, and one hand is free. She stretches out wide and almost cries with relief.

She doesn’t waste time on the second cuff, instead pulls on the clothes that she discarded before her shower earlier. Her heart is beating double time as she creeps down the stairs and stares at the front door. None of the windows in the house open, Alex had locked them all and discarded the keys before Bernie was even aware of her surroundings. But the front door… Bernie’s freedom will be determined by her ability to guess the code to the key safe.

She takes several calming breaths and looks at the numbers carefully. She’s never been able to see Alex punch the numbers in – Alex was too careful for that – but she can see that some of the numbers are more faded than the others, and there’s an oily sheen to them from months of use. Four numbers. Enough possible combinations that Bernie could be here for hours. She clenches and unclenches her fingers and forces herself to focus.

One, two, four, zero.

Okay. With a two and a zero, it could be a year. And then suddenly it clicks into place. 2014. The year that Bernie had kissed Alex for the first time. Bernie almost laughs and she knows she’s right. She’s nearly out. Just needs coat and shoes. She hasn’t got any here – why would she need them, when she never leaves the house? – but Alex does and luckily they’re nearly enough the same side. She slips on the heavy overcoat and laces up the boots. They’re every so slightly small but Bernie has put up with enough discomfort over the last months, a little more on the road to freedom doesn’t bother her.

With trembling fingers, Bernie punches in the code and the safe opens. She picks the key out, listening all the time for movement upstairs. She wills the key to turn quietly, the door to swing open without creaking. And they do. And then she’s out in the cold night air and moving as swiftly as she can, away from the cottage, away from Alex, to Serena. Always, to Serena.

When she’s got down the lane, far enough away that she knows she isn’t being pursued, she slows her pace. Months of confinement and her injuries means she doesn’t have much strength to call on. She shoves her hands in her pockets to keep them warm and finds something smooth and thick in one. She pulls it out and then she does laugh, long and loud. It’s Alex’s wallet. Her plan before had been to hitch hike but thanks to the wonders of contactless, she has funds. And there’s cash too. Joy of joys.

Streetlights glow and she’s reached a village. Most of the houses are dark but the pub still has lights on.

“Nearly closing,” the landlord warns her as she clambers onto a barstool, but he serves her a coffee and calls her a taxi.

She looks wistfully at the bottles of whisky but tonight is not the night for alcohol. Once she’s safe in Holby, with Serena, then she’ll celebrate. But the coffee is strong and hot, brings a smile to her face and wakes her up thoroughly.

The taxi takes her to the train station and she sits cuddled in the thankfully unlocked waiting room, dozing fitfully, until the first train of the morning arrives and whisks her away. Alex is far behind her now and Serena is shining in the future.

* * *

Serena gathers her things, takes one last look around the office that has felt like a second home for so many years. How funny that leaving the office behind is almost as hard as leaving the job. If she closes her eyes she can see so many people she loved here. So many ghosts, now. Bernie’s smile and Raf’s laugh. Jasmine’s worried face. Elinor’s pout.

Bernie’s desk hasn’t really been Bernie’s desk for months. Years, since they last shared this office, but still, she drops one hand to the chair as she passes, slides her hand over the back, swallows the tears that are threatening.

Leaving Holby feels like leaving Bernie. Again.

“Are you coming, Auntie Serena?” Jason’s voice pierces her melancholy and she shakes herself.

“Yes, yes.” She casts one final, final look around the room then closes the door firmly behind her.

“Are we going to go to Albie’s?” Jason asks her as she joins him.

“I don’t know,” she says, “I’ll see how I feel when I get to the car.” AAU seems quiet. Lou sends her a quick smile and a nod as she scribbles down some patient obs. Ange is busy at the other end of the ward, but otherwise it’s deserted.

The odd feeling of quiet continues as she makes her way down the lift and out to the front of the hospital and then suddenly there’s noise and clapping and she stops abruptly. A huge crowd is there, cheering.

“This is for _you_ , Aunty Serena,” Jason says, and she grasps blindly for his hand. He lets her hold him, even squeezes gently.

“Well then,” she says, and steps forward.

His fellow porters way lay him and Jason disappears into the throng, leaving Serena to walk out alone, head held high and tears once again trembling on the edge of her eyelashes. She smiles and nods and waves and it’s overwhelming, until finally she’s through the crowd and blissfully alone in the car park. She dashes her hand over her eyes and blinks. There’s somebody standing next to her car. A familiar, beloved somebody. What an odd time she’s picked to start hallucinating.

She walks forward slowly, studying Bernie, expecting at every moment that she’ll vanish back into the depths of her subconscious. She’s skinny. Serena has seen people in their eighties with muscles that look that atrophied. She’s tired. Big bags under her eyes. And what an odd coat.

Serena reaches the car and she’s still there. A tremulous smile appears on Bernie’s lips. “Serena?” she says, quietly.

Serena drops her bags and flings herself at Bernie. Buries her head into her shoulder, runs her fingers through her hair because she’s real and she’s here. “Bernie,” she gasps. “Oh, Bernie.”

“I didn’t want to interrupt,” Bernie says, and there’s so much happiness in her voice that Serena does cry, “Seemed like quite the farewell.”

Serena draws back, cups Bernie’s cheek, strokes her thumb across those beautiful cheekbones of hers. “But you’re dead. We had a funeral. We had _two_ funerals! I don’t understand.”

Bernie turns her head and presses a kiss into Serena’s palm. “The short story is that Alex made almost all of it up. I’m so sorry.”

“The long story?”

“I’ll tell you later,” Bernie says, “If I can come home with you.” Her laugh is almost on the verge of hysterical, “I don’t really have anywhere else to go.”

“Of course you’re coming home with me,” Serena says, lets go of Bernie with one hand to open the passenger door, pushes her onto the seat. “But where have you _been_?”

“Would you believe me if I said chained to Alex’s radiator?”

Serena climbs into the drivers seat. Her gaze slips to Bernie’s wrists, now revealed as she leans back in the seat. There are thick welts around them. “Oh, Bernie,” she says.

“It’s alright now,” Bernie whispers. “It’s all alright, now I’m with you.”

Later, they curl up together on Serena’s sofa, Shiraz and whisky in hand, and Bernie tells Serena the whole story. Tomorrow they’ll call the police and Bernie’s kids, but for now Bernie rests her head on Serena’s shoulder, hums as Serena cards her fingers lazily through her hair. The bedroom upstairs is waiting and so is the rest of their lives. Together, as they should be.


End file.
